System and method for packet forwarding using a conjunctive normal form strategy in a content-centric network

ABSTRACT

One embodiment of the present invention provides a system for forwarding packets with hierarchically structured variable-length identifiers (HSVLIs) in a content-centric network (CCN). During operation, the system receives a packet with an HSVLI and determines, based on the HSVLI, a plurality of ports to which the packet should be forwarded. The plurality of ports include a set of individual port groups, and a respective port group includes one or more individual physical ports. The system derives a forwarding strategy based on the set of individual port groups and the one or more individual physical ports. The forwarding strategy is expressed as a formula in conjunctive normal form that indicates a logical conjunction among the set of port groups and a logical disjunction among the one or more individual physical ports. The system then forwards the packet using the derived forwarding strategy.

RELATED APPLICATIONS

The subject matter of this application is related to the subject matter in the following applications:

-   -   U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/065,691, entitled “SYSTEM         AND METHOD FOR HASH-BASED FORWARDING OF PACKETS WITH         HIERARCHICALLY STRUCTURED VARIABLE-LENGTH IDENTIFIERS,” by         inventors Marc E. Mosko and Michael F. Plass, filed 29 Oct.         2013;     -   U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/067,857, entitled “SYSTEM         AND METHOD FOR MINIMUM PATH MTU DISCOVERY IN CONTENT CENTRIC         NETWORKS,” by inventor Marc E. Mosko, filed 30 Oct. 2013; and     -   U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/069,286, entitled         “HASH-BASED FORWARDING OF PACKETS WITH HIERARCHICALLY STRUCTURED         VARIABLE-LENGTH IDENTIFIERS OVER ETHERNET,” by inventors Marc E.         Mosko, Ramesh C. Ayyagari, and Subbiah Kandasamy, filed 31 Oct.         2013;         the disclosures of which are herein incorporated by reference in         their entirety.

BACKGROUND

1. Field

The present disclosure relates generally to facilitating communication over a data network. More specifically, the present disclosure relates to a system and method for facilitating packet forwarding using a strategy based on conjunctive normal form.

2. Related Art

The proliferation of the Internet and e-commerce continues to fuel revolutionary changes in the network industry. Today, a significant number of information exchanges, from online movie viewing to daily news delivery, retail sales, and instant messaging, are conducted online. An increasing number of Internet applications are also becoming mobile. However, the current Internet operates on a largely location-based addressing scheme. The two most ubiquitous protocols, the Internet Protocol (IP) and Ethernet protocol, are both based on location-based addresses. That is, a consumer of content can only receive the content by explicitly requesting the content from an address (e.g., IP address or Ethernet media access control (MAC) address) closely associated with a physical object or location. This restrictive addressing scheme is becoming progressively more inadequate for meeting the ever-changing network demands.

Recently, content-centric network (CCN) architectures have been proposed in the industry. CCN brings a new approach to content transport. Instead of having network traffic viewed at the application level as end-to-end conversations over which content travels, content is requested or returned based on its unique name, and the network is responsible for routing content from the provider to the consumer. Note that content includes data that can be transported in the communication system, including any form of data such as text, images, video, and/or audio. A consumer and a provider can be a person at a computer or an automated process inside or outside the CCN. A piece of content can refer to the entire content or a respective portion of the content. For example, a newspaper article might be represented by multiple pieces of content embodied as data packets. A piece of content can also be associated with metadata describing or augmenting the piece of content with information such as authentication data, creation date, content owner, etc.

In CCN, content objects and interests are identified by their names, which is typically a hierarchically structured variable-length identifier (HSVLI). When forwarding packets with HSVLIs, longest-prefix-match lookups are often performed at the forwarding information base (FIB), which maintains a record of the Interest forwarding routes. Unlike the FIB used in IP (Internet Protocol) networks, the FIB used in CCNs allows for a list of outgoing ports for each prefix rather than a single port.

SUMMARY

One embodiment of the present invention provides a system for forwarding packets with hierarchically structured variable-length identifiers (HSVLIs) in a content-centric network (CCN). During operation, the system receives a packet with an HSVLI and determines, based on the HSVLI, a plurality of ports to which the packet should be forwarded. The plurality of ports include a first set of distinct port groups, and a respective port group includes a second set of individual physical or virtual ports. Note that the second set of individual physical or virtual ports are—for purposes of forwarding—considered equivalent. The system derives a forwarding strategy based on the first set of port groups and the second set of physical or virtual ports. The forwarding strategy is expressed as a formula in conjunctive normal form that indicates a logical conjunction among the first set of port groups, and a logical disjunction among the second set of individual physical or virtual ports. The system then forwards the packet using the derived forwarding strategy.

In a variation on this embodiment, the packet is an interest in a piece of content corresponding to the HSVLI, and determining the plurality of ports involves performing a longest-match lookup in a forwarding information base.

In a further variation, performing the longest-match lookup involves calculating a fixed-length hash function of the HSVLI.

In a variation on this embodiment, the virtual port group is a link aggregation group (LAG). The system uses a scheduler associated with the LAG to make forwarding decisions among multiple physical ports associated with the LAG.

In a variation on this embodiment, the virtual port group is a multi-path port group generated by a higher-level routing protocol. The system uses the higher-level routing protocol to make forwarding decisions among multiple physical ports associated with the multi-path port group.

In a variation on this embodiment, the forwarding strategy specifies that the packet is to be forwarded to each and every port within the first set of physical ports and at least one port within the second set of physical ports.

In a further variation, the forwarding strategy further specifies that the packet is to be forwarded to a minimum number of physical ports among ports within the port group.

In a variation on this embodiment, a higher-level routing protocol may determine that a specific destination is reachable via several physical or logical ports, such that the destination is represented as a conjunctive term of a disjunction of those physical or logical ports.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE FIGURES

FIG. 1 illustrates an exemplary architecture of a network, in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 presents a diagram illustrating an exemplary packet-forwarding engine in a content-centric network (CCN), in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 presents a diagram illustrating the forwarding strategy based on a formula in conjunctive normal form, in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 4 illustrates the process of forwarding an Interest packet, in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 5 illustrates an exemplary computer system for forwarding packets using a strategy expressed in conjunctive normal form, in accordance with an embodiment.

In the figures, like reference numerals refer to the same figure elements.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Overview

Embodiments of the present invention provide a system and method for effectively forwarding packets in CCNs to a plurality of ports. More specifically, the plurality of ports may include individual ports and port groups. A port group can be a link aggregation group where multiple links connect two devices, or it can be a multi-path group where multiple paths exist to reach a single destination. At the forwarding information base (FIB), the routing protocol uses a conjunctive normal form strategy to forward an Interest to all the ports listed in the FIB entry for a particular name prefix. Among the ports within a port group, an “OR” routing policy is applied, such that the Interest only needs to follow at minimum one, and preferably at most one, path for the port group. Among the different port groups, an “AND” routing policy is applied.

In general, CCN uses two types of messages: Interests and Content Objects. An Interest carries the hierarchically structured variable-length identifier (HSVLI), also called the “name,” of a Content Object and serves as a request for that object. If a network element (e.g., router) receives multiple interests for the same name, it may aggregate those interests. A network element along the path of the Interest with a matching Content Object may cache and return that object, satisfying the Interest. The Content Object follows the reverse path of the Interest to the origin(s) of the Interest. A Content Object contains, among other information, the same HSVLI, the object's payload, and cryptographic information used to bind the HSVLI to the payload.

The terms used in the present disclosure are generally defined as follows (but their interpretation is not limited to such):

-   -   “HSVLI:” Hierarchically structured variable-length identifier,         also called a Name. It is an ordered list of Name Components,         which may be variable length octet strings. In human-readable         form, it can be represented in a format such as ccnx:/path/part.         There is not a host or query string. As mentioned above, HSVLIs         refer to content, and it is desirable that they be able to         represent organizational structures for content and be at least         partially meaningful to humans. An individual component of an         HSVLI may have an arbitrary length. Furthermore, HSVLIs can have         explicitly delimited components, can include any sequence of         bytes, and are not limited to human-readable characters. A         longest-prefix-match lookup is important in forwarding packets         with HSVLIs. For example, an HSVLI indicating an interest in         “/parc/home/bob” will match both “/parc/home/bob/test.txt” and         “/parc/home/bob/bar.txt.” The longest match, in terms of the         number of name components, is considered the best because it is         the most specific.     -   “Interest:” A request for a Content Object. The Interest         specifies an HSVLI name prefix and other optional selectors that         can be used to choose among multiple objects with the same name         prefix. Any Content Object whose name matches the Interest name         prefix and selectors satisfies the Interest.     -   “Content Object:” A data object sent in response to an Interest.         It has an HSVLI name and a Contents payload that are bound         together via a cryptographic signature. Optionally, all Content         Objects have an implicit terminal name component made up of the         SHA-256 digest of the Content Object. In one embodiment, the         implicit digest is not transferred on the wire, but is computed         at each hop, if needed.

As mentioned before, an HSVLI indicates a piece of content, is hierarchically structured, and includes contiguous components ordered from a most general level to a most specific level. The length of a respective HSVLI is not fixed. In content-centric networks, unlike a conventional IP network, a packet may be identified by an HSVLI. For example, “abcd/bob/papers/ccn/news” could be the name of the content and identifies the corresponding packet(s), i.e., the “news” article from the “ccn” collection of papers for a user named “Bob” at the organization named “ABCD.” To request a piece of content, a node expresses (e.g., broadcasts) an interest in that content by the content's name. An interest in a piece of content can be a query for the content according to the content's name or identifier. The content, if available in the network, is routed back to it from any node that stores the content. The routing infrastructure intelligently propagates the interest to the prospective nodes that are likely to have the information and then carries available content back along the path which the interest traversed.

FIG. 1 illustrates an exemplary architecture of a network, in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. In this example, a network 180 comprises nodes 100-145. Each node in the network is coupled to one or more other nodes. Network connection 185 is an example of such a connection. The network connection is shown as a solid line, but each line could also represent sub-networks or super-networks, which can couple one node to another node. Network 180 can be content-centric, a local network, a super-network, or a sub-network. Each of these networks can be interconnected so that a node in one network can reach a node in other networks. The network connection can be broadband, wireless, telephonic, satellite, or any type of network connection. A node can be a computer system, an end-point representing users, and/or a device that can generate interest or originate content.

In accordance with an embodiment of the present invention, a consumer can generate an Interest in a piece of content and then send that Interest to a node in network 180. The piece of content can be stored at a node in network 180 by a publisher or content provider, who can be located inside or outside the network. For example, in FIG. 1, the Interest in a piece of content originates at node 105. If the content is not available at the node, the Interest flows to one or more nodes coupled to the first node. For example, in FIG. 1, the Interest flows (interest flow 150) to node 115, which does not have the content available. Next, the Interest flows (interest flow 155) from node 115 to node 125, which again does not have the content. The Interest then flows (interest flow 160) to node 130, which does have the content available. The flow of the content then retraces its path in reverse (content flows 165, 170, and 175) until it reaches node 105, where the content is delivered. Other processes such as authentication can be involved in the flow of content.

In network 180, any number of intermediate nodes (nodes 100-145) in the path between a content holder (node 130) and the Interest generation node (node 105) can participate in caching local copies of the content as it travels across the network. Caching reduces the network load for a second subscriber located in proximity to other subscribers by implicitly sharing access to the locally cached content.

Interest Forwarding

FIG. 2 presents a diagram illustrating an exemplary packet-forwarding engine in a content-centric network (CCN), in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. In FIG. 2, packet-forwarding engine 200 includes three major data structures, including a Forwarding Information Base (FIB) 202, a Content Store (CS) 204, and a Pending-Interest Table (PIT) 206.

FIB 202 is used to forward Interest packets toward potential source(s) of matching Content Objects. Typically, a routing protocol is used to populate the FIB among all nodes in the network. The FIB entries are often indexed by the name prefixes. Note that, in CCN, there might be multiple sources that can satisfy an Interest. For example, multiple content producers may have the same name prefix. Therefore, unlike IP, an FIB entry in CCNs may include a list of outgoing ports. This reflects the fact that CCN is not restricted to forwarding on a spanning tree, because the self-satisfying nature of the Interests and the Content Objects means the loops can be avoided without establishing a spanning tree. In addition, this allows multiple sources to be queried in parallel.

Content Store (CS) 204 is similar to the buffer memory used in an IP router. More particularly, CS 204 temporarily buffers Content Objects that pass through this node, allowing efficient data retrieval by different consumers. When a router receives an Interest packet, it first checks whether there is a matching Content Object in its content store.

PIT 206 keeps track of Interests forwarded upstream toward content source(s) so that a returned Content Object can be sent downstream to its requester(s). In CCN, only Interest packets are routed. The returning Content Object follows the trail of the Interest packet back to the content requester. A PIT entry for an Interest specifies the name of the Interest and one or multiple incoming and outgoing ports for that Interest. Multiple ports listed in the PIT entry indicate that the same content has been requested by multiple downstream users, and multiple outgoing ports indicate that the same Interest is forwarded along multiple paths.

When an Interest packet arrives on a certain port, a longest-match lookup is done based on the content name, or the HSVLI. In some embodiments, hash-based forwarding is used, where each node uses the same hash function to encode name prefixes and then performs a longest-match lookup at the fixed-length hash. Detailed descriptions of the hash forwarding can be found in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/065,961, entitled “SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR HASH-BASED FORWARDING OF PACKETS WITH HIERARCHICALLY STRUCTURED VARIABLE-LENGTH IDENTIFIERS,” by inventors Marc E. Mosko and Michael F. Plass, filed 29 Oct. 2013, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety. However, the strategy for forwarding packets to multiple ports, as used by embodiments of the present invention, is not limited to hash-based forwarding. Systems that rely on other types of CCN forwarding, such as those based on longest-prefix-match lookups using the HSVLI, can also use the same port-forwarding strategy.

The index structure used for the name lookup is ordered in such a way that a CS match will be preferred over a PIT match, which will be preferred over an FIB match. Hence, if there is already a Content Object in CS 204 that matches the Interest, the Content Object will be sent out via the port the Interest arrived on and the Interest will be discarded. Otherwise, the PIT will be checked to see if a match can be found. If so, the Interest's arrival port will be added to the PIT entry's requesting port list and the Interest will be discarded. Otherwise, the FIB will be checked. Note that for a system relying on hash forwarding, the FIB entries may be indexed based on the forwarding hashes, and checking the FIB involves finding a longest matching prefix in the FIB. If there is a match in the FIB, then the Interest needs to be forwarded to one or more of the ports listed in the FIB entry based on a forwarding strategy (or rule).

Note that for hardware implementations of CCN forwarding engines, it is desirable to have a forwarding strategy that is simple to execute but expressive, especially in situations where a port in the FIB entry represents a virtual port group, which points to a set of other ports. In CCN, a virtual port group may include a link aggregation group (LAG) where a set of network connections are combined in parallel to increase the throughput between two devices, and to provide redundancy in case of a link failure. Note that here the term “link aggregation group” can be used to refer not only to various schemes used by vendor-independent standards, such as the Link Aggregation Control Protocol (LACP) for Ethernet, but also to various proprietary solutions, such as Cisco's Port Aggregation Protocol (PAgP). In addition, a virtual port group can also be created when a single destination can be reached via multiple paths. Note that within each virtual port group, the Interest needs to be sent to a minimum of one port.

In the example shown in FIG. 2, the FIB entry for a name prefix /abc.com includes a list of forwarding ports, including ports 7, 12, 39, 122, and 1290, that may direct Interests with the name prefix /abc.com to corresponding content producers. Among these ports, port 1290 actually represents a virtual port group, which points to a set of other ports. For example, port 1290 may point to physical ports 6, 22, and 130. Note that because physical ports 6, 22, and 130 are link aggregated, which means they can lead to the same destination device, the Interest only needs to be forwarded to one of these ports. Hence, an “OR” policy can be used for these ports. On the other hand, the Interest needs to be forwarded to all other physical ports (ports 7, 12, 39, and 122). In some embodiments, when a forwarding engine uses an FIB entry to forward an Interest, the forwarding engine applies a forwarding strategy (or rule) that is expressed in a conjunctive normal form, such as

${\bigwedge\limits_{i = 1}^{n}{\bigvee\limits_{j = 1}^{m_{i}}C_{ij}}},$ where C_(ij), i−1, . . . , n; j=1, . . . m_(i), is either an atomic formula (such as a variable or constant) or the negation of an atomic formula. Here C_(ij) represents a physical port, which may be a standalone physical port (when m_(i)=1) or a physical port belonging to a virtual port group (when m_(i)>1). Note that the conjunctive normal form refers to an ANDed set of ORed sets of statements. More specifically, the conjunctive normal form Boolean expression indicates that while forwarding, an AND operation is performed among the single physical ports and virtual port groups, and an OR operation is performed among the multiple ports within each virtual port group. Alternatively, the forwarding strategy can be expressed as

${{\bigwedge\limits_{i = 1}^{k}{A_{i}\bigwedge\limits_{i = {k + 1}}^{n}B_{i}}} = {\bigwedge\limits_{i = 1}^{k}{A_{i}\bigwedge\left( {\bigwedge\limits_{i = {k + 1}}^{n}{\bigvee\limits_{j = 1}^{m_{i}}B_{ij}}} \right)}}},$ where A_(i) represents standalone physical ports, and B_(ij) represents a physical port belonging to a virtual group B_(i).

In the aforementioned example shown in FIG. 2, the standalone physical ports include ports 7, 12, 39, and 122, and the LAG includes ports 6, 22, and 130; hence, the forwarding strategy (or rule) for a packet with the longest prefix match to the name prefix /abc.com can be expressed as:

forwarding the packet to ports (7)

(12)

( 39 )

(122)

(6

22

130). This Boolean expression indicates that the corresponding Interest packet will be forwarded to all of the following ports: ports 7, 12, 39, and 122. In addition, the Interest packet will be forwarded to port 6, or 22, or 130. Note that because ports 6, 22, and 130 belong to the same LAG, as long as the Interest is forwarded to one of these ports, the device at the other end of the LAG will receive the Interest packet.

FIG. 3 presents a diagram illustrating the forwarding strategy based on a formula in conjunctive normal form, in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. In FIG. 3, intermediate node 300 includes a number of ports, such as ports 5, 7, 12, 39, 122, 6, 22, 130, and 160. During operation, intermediate node 300 receives an Interest packet from one of its ports, and performs the longest prefix match using the name of the Interest against entries in FIB 302. The matching FIB entry may include a list of ports (in this example, ports 7, 12, 39, 122, and 1290) indicating that the matching Interest should be forwarded to these ports in order to reach the content sources. The FIB entry may also indicate that port 1290 is a LAG, which includes three physical ports, ports 6, 22, and 130.

Based on the matching FIB entry, the forwarding engine within intermediate node 300 can apply a forwarding strategy (or rule) expressed using a formula that is in conjunctive normal form, such as: forwarding to ports (7)

(12)

(39)

(122)

(6

22

130). In some embodiments, this conjunctive normal form expression can be stored in FIB 302. The conjunction relationship among the ports (including the virtual port groups) ensures that the matching Interest is forwarded to all of the ports listed in the FIB entry, and hence the Interest has a chance to reach all possible sources of the requested content. In FIG. 3, the solid arrows represent the AND logic, meaning that the Interest packet is sent to all these ports. On the other hand, for virtual port group 1290, among the ports within the group (such as ports 6, 22, and 130), a forwarding policy of “OR” can be applied, where the Interest can be forwarded to at least one of the ports. Note that the dashed arrows represent the OR logic, meaning that the Interest packet can be sent to any one or more of the ports within the virtual port group. Note that the “OR” relationship among the ports within the virtual port group ensures that the Interest packet only needs to be sent to at minimum one (and preferably at most one) of the ports.

In some embodiments, a LAG scheduler, such as LAG scheduler 304, can be used to determine to which physical port within in the virtual port group the Interest should be sent. For example, LAG scheduler 304 may distribute the Interest among the ports (such as ports 6, 22, and 130) in a round-robin fashion, or LAG scheduler 304 may distribute the Interest among the ports based on a hash function.

If virtual port group 1290 includes a set of ports that are grouped together by the routing protocol as a multi-path group, a different type of scheduler, such as one based on opportunistic multi-path scheduling that favors low-delay high-throughput paths, may be used to distribute the Interest among the multi-path ports. Alternatively, the scheduler may also use a round-robin fashion to distribute Interest packets among the multi-path ports.

In certain scenarios, a FIB entry may include both an LAG and a multi-path group, along with one or more physical ports. For example, a FIB entry for a name prefix /def.com may list a group of ports, including ports 7, 22, 1290, and a multi-path port group that includes physical ports 72 and 81. Among them, ports 7 and 22 are physical ports, and port 1290 is a LAG, which includes physical ports 6, 22, and 130. In some embodiments, FIB 302 generates the following forwarding strategy for this name prefix using a formula in conjunctive normal form: (7)

(22)

(72

81)

(6

22

130). Note that in this formula the LAG and the multi-path port group are treated similarly as an “OR” being performed over the physical ports within each virtual port group. Note that, even with the three different types of ports or port groups, the expression of the forwarding strategy only involves a two-step recursion, and can be relatively simple to implement. On the other hand, Interest forwarding within each virtual port group is not included in this conjunctive normal form formula. In some embodiments, A LAG scheduler can be used to distribute traffic within each LAG, and a separate scheduler (such as the one defined by the routing protocol that generates the multi-path port group) may be used to distribute traffic within each multi-path port group.

Sometimes, there may be overlaps between a LAG and a multi-path port group. In the aforementioned example, the FIB entry for name prefix /def.com includes ports 7, 22, 1290, and a multi-path port group. Among them port 1290 is a LAG that includes physical ports 6, 22, and 130. If the multi-path port group includes physical ports 6 and 72, then physical port 6 belongs to both LAG 1290 and the multi-path port group. As a result, forwarding the Interest to physical port 6 can serve both virtual port groups. In some embodiments, a scheduler (which may be the LAG scheduler, or a separate scheduler) can compute the most effective forwarding strategy for such a situation using a more sophisticated routing algorithm. In general, the optimal forwarding strategy is to minimize the number of physical ports to which the packet is forwarded. Such a strategy may result in an Interest being forwarded to more than one physical port within a port group. For example, an FIB entry may list three port groups, (1 or 2 or 3), (2 or 7), and (3 or 8). The system may determine that the optimal forwarding strategy is to forward the Interest to ports 1, 2, and 3, which means that the interest is forwarded over all 3 ports within the first group.

FIG. 4 illustrates the process of forwarding an Interest packet, in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. During operation, an intermediate node in a CCN network receives an Interest packet with an HSVLI (operation 402). Note that the intermediate node can be a CCN-enabled switch that maintains the three major CCN data structures, the content store (CS), the pending Interest table (PIT), and the forwarding information base (FIB).

The intermediate node then determines, based on the name prefix of the Interest, whether an entry corresponding to the Interest can be found in the PIT (operation 404). If so, the node adds the ingress port on which the Interest is received to the corresponding PIT entry (operation 406). Otherwise, the node further determines, based on the name prefix, whether the content corresponding to the Interest can be found in the local Content Store (operation 408). If so, the node returns the matching Content Object (operation 410). If not, the system then adds a corresponding entry to the PIT (operation 412).

Subsequently, the node determines, based on the name prefix, whether an entry corresponding to the Interest can be found in the FIB (operation 414). In some embodiments, a longest prefix match is performed. If no matching entry is found in the FIB, the node may drop the Interest packet because it does not know where to forward the Interest (operation 416). If a corresponding entry can be found in the FIB, the node further identifies any virtual port group within the list of ports (operation 418). In some embodiments, the virtual port group can be a link aggregation group (LAG) or a multi-path port group. For each virtual port group, the node determines the actual physical port associated with the group (operation 420). Based on the list of ports in the FIB entry and the analysis of each virtual port group, the node then derives a forwarding strategy expressed in a formula in conjunctive normal form (operation 422). According to the formula, the Interest is forwarded to each physical port listed in the FIB entry (as the formula expresses an “AND” logic among all physical ports). In addition, the Interest should be forwarded to each virtual port group listed in the FIB entry, as the formula expresses a similar “AND” logic among the virtual port groups and the physical ports. However, within each virtual port group, instead of an “AND” logic (meaning sending the Interest to all physical ports), the formula indicates that an “OR” logic should be applied among all physical ports associated with the same virtual port group. This ensures that the Interest is forwarded to a minimum of one port within each virtual port group. In fact, it is also preferred that the Interest is forwarded to at most one of the physical ports within the virtual port group to reduce unnecessary traffic. The node then forwards the Interest based on the derived forwarding strategy (operation 424).

FIG. 5 illustrates an exemplary computer system for forwarding packets using a strategy expressed in conjunctive normal form, in accordance with an embodiment. A computer system 500 for forwarding packets includes a processor 510, a memory 520, and a storage 530. Storage 530 typically stores instructions that can be loaded into memory 520 and executed by processor 510 to perform the conjunctive normal form packet forwarding mentioned above. In one embodiment, the instructions in storage 530 can implement one or more of: a CS module 532, a PIT module 534, a FIB module 536, and a forwarding module 538, all of which can be in communication with each other through various means.

In some embodiments, modules 532, 534, 536, and 538 can be partially or entirely implemented in hardware and can be part of processor 510. Further, in some embodiments, the system may not include a separate processor and memory. Instead, in addition to performing their specific tasks, modules 532, 534, 536, and 538, either separately or in concert, may be part of general- or special-purpose computation engines.

Storage 530 stores programs to be executed by processor 510. Specifically, storage 530 stores a program that implements a system (application) for performing conjunctive normal form packet forwarding. During operation, the application program can be loaded from storage 530 into memory 520 and executed by processor 510. As a result, system 500 can perform the functions described above. System 500 can be coupled to an optional display 580, keyboard 560, and pointing device 570, and can also be coupled via one or more network interfaces to network 582.

The data structures and code described in this detailed description are typically stored on a computer-readable storage medium, which may be any device or medium that can store code and/or data for use by a computer system. The computer-readable storage medium includes, but is not limited to, volatile memory, non-volatile memory, magnetic and optical storage devices such as disk drives, magnetic tape, CDs (compact discs), DVDs (digital versatile discs or digital video discs), or other media capable of storing computer-readable media now known or later developed.

The methods and processes described in the detailed description section can be embodied as code and/or data, which can be stored in a computer-readable storage medium as described above. When a computer system reads and executes the code and/or data stored on the computer-readable storage medium, the computer system performs the methods and processes embodied as data structures and code and stored within the computer-readable storage medium.

Furthermore, methods and processes described herein can be included in hardware modules or apparatus. These modules or apparatus may include, but are not limited to, an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) chip, a field-programmable gate array (FPGA), a dedicated or shared processor that executes a particular software module or a piece of code at a particular time, and/or other programmable-logic devices now known or later developed. When the hardware modules or apparatus are activated, they perform the methods and processes included within them.

The above description is presented to enable any person skilled in the art to make and use the embodiments, and is provided in the context of a particular application and its requirements. Various modifications to the disclosed embodiments will be readily apparent to those skilled in the art, and the general principles defined herein may be applied to other embodiments and applications without departing from the spirit and scope of the present disclosure. Thus, the present invention is not limited to the embodiments shown, but is to be accorded the widest scope consistent with the principles and features disclosed herein. 

What is claimed is:
 1. A computer-executable method for forwarding packets with hierarchically structured variable-length identifiers (HSVLIs) in a content-centric network (CCN), the method comprising: receiving a packet with an HSVLI; determining, based on the HSVLI, a set of standalone physical ports; determining, based on the HSVLI, a set of virtual port groups, wherein a respective virtual port group includes one or more individual physical ports; deriving a forwarding strategy expressed as a formula in conjunctive normal form that indicates a logical conjunction among the standalone physical ports and the virtual port groups, and wherein the respective virtual port group is expressed as a logical disjunction among the one or more individual physical ports belonging to the virtual port group; and forwarding the packet using the derived forwarding strategy.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein the packet is an interest in a piece of content corresponding to the HSVLI, wherein determining the set of standalone physical ports and the set of virtual port groups involves performing a longest-match lookup in a forwarding information base.
 3. The method of claim 2, wherein performing the longest-match lookup involves calculating a fixed-length hash function of the HSVLI.
 4. The method of claim 1, wherein the set of virtual port groups include a link aggregation group (LAG), and wherein the method further comprises using a scheduler associated with the LAG to make forwarding decisions among multiple physical ports associated with the LAG.
 5. The method of claim 1, wherein the set of virtual port groups include a multi-path port group generated by a higher-level routing protocol, and wherein the method further comprises using the higher-level routing protocol to make forwarding decisions among multiple physical ports associated with the multi-path port group.
 6. The method of claim 1, wherein the forwarding strategy specifies that the packet is to be forwarded to each and every standalone physical port and to at least one individual physical port within the respective virtual port group.
 7. The method of claim 6, wherein the forwarding strategy further specifies that the packet is to be forwarded to a minimum number of physical ports among ports within the set of virtual port groups.
 8. A system for forwarding packets with hierarchically structured variable-length identifiers (HSVLIs) in a content-centric network (CCN), the system comprising: a processor; and a storage device coupled to the processor and storing instructions which when executed by the processor cause the processor to perform a method, the method comprising: receiving a packet with an HSVLI; determining, based on the HSVLI, a set of standalone physical ports; determining, based on the HSVLI, a set of virtual port groups, wherein a respective virtual port group includes one or more individual physical ports; deriving a forwarding strategy expressed as a formula in conjunctive normal form that indicates a logical conjunction among the standalone physical ports and the virtual port groups, and wherein the respective virtual port group is expressed as a logical disjunction among the one or more individual physical ports belonging to the respective virtual port group; and forwarding the packet using the derived forwarding strategy.
 9. The system of claim 8, wherein the packet is an interest in a piece of content corresponding to the HSVLI, wherein determining the set of standalone physical ports and the set of virtual port groups involves performing a longest-match lookup in a forwarding information base.
 10. The system of claim 9, wherein performing the longest-match lookup involves calculating a fixed-length hash function of the HSVLI.
 11. The system of claim 8, wherein the set of virtual port groups include a link aggregation group (LAG), and wherein the method further comprises using a scheduler associated with the LAG to make forwarding decisions among multiple physical ports associated with the LAG.
 12. The system of claim 8, wherein the set of virtual port groups include a multi-path port group generated by a higher-level routing protocol, and wherein the method further comprises using the higher-level routing protocol to make forwarding decisions among multiple physical ports associated with the multi-path port group.
 13. The system of claim 8, wherein the forwarding strategy specifies that the packet is to be forwarded to each and every standalone physical port and to at least one individual physical port within the respective virtual port group.
 14. The system of claim 13, wherein the forwarding strategy further specifies that the packet is to be forwarded to a minimum number of physical ports among ports within the set of virtual port groups.
 15. A computer-readable storage device storing instructions that when executed by a computer cause the computer to perform a method for forwarding packets with hierarchically structured variable-length identifiers (HSVLIs) in a content-centric network (CCN), the method comprising: receiving a packet with an HSVLI; determining, based on the HSVLI, a set of standalone physical ports; determining, based on the HSVLI, a set of virtual port groups, wherein a respective virtual port group includes one or more individual physical ports; deriving a forwarding strategy expressed as a formula in conjunctive normal form that indicates a logical conjunction among the standalone physical ports and the virtual port groups, and wherein the respective virtual port group is expressed as a logical disjunction among the one or more individual physical ports belonging to the respective virtual port group; and forwarding the packet using the derived forwarding strategy.
 16. The device of claim 15, wherein the packet is an interest in a piece of content corresponding to the HSVLI, wherein determining the set of standalone physical ports and the set of virtual port groups involves performing a longest-match lookup in a forwarding information base.
 17. The device of claim 16, wherein performing the longest-match lookup involves calculating a fixed-length hash function of the HSVLI.
 18. The device of claim 15, wherein the set of virtual port groups include a link aggregation group (LAG), and wherein the method further comprises using a scheduler associated with the LAG to make forwarding decisions among multiple physical ports associated with the LAG.
 19. The device of claim 15, wherein the set of virtual port groups include a multi-path port group generated by a higher-level routing protocol, and wherein the method further comprises using the higher-level routing protocol to make forwarding decisions among multiple physical ports associated with the multi-path port group.
 20. The device of claim 15, wherein the forwarding strategy specifies that the packet is to be forwarded to each and every standalone physical port and to at least one individual physical port within the respective virtual port group.
 21. The device of claim 20, wherein the forwarding strategy further specifies that the packet is to be forwarded to a minimum number of physical ports among ports within the set of virtual port groups. 